Sunday, 31 August 2014

Anti-Semitism or Anti-Judaism?

Anti-Semitic or Anti-Jewish? For too long, we have been talking about Anti-Semitism when in fact we should be talking about Anti-Judaism because both Arabs and Jews are Semites.

Unless we make a clear distinction between the two, we would face the paradox of calling Arabs Anti-Semites because Arabs are Semites.

What is happening across Europe could be called Anti-Semitism insofar both Jews and Arabs are targeted. When Jews alone are targeted it is not Anti-Semitic. It is Anti-Jewish.

In the minds of ordinary people, all Jews and all Arabs are the same and then things get a lot more complicated when we introduce religion into the equation. The vast majority of Muslims are not Arabs. Or to put it in another way: many Arabs are Muslim, but not all Muslims are Arab.

We raise the stakes even further when there is a war in which Muslims are killing Muslims. Therefore, it becomes even more difficult to tell the different between good ones and bad ones. Undoubtedly, if you say that more than 95% of all Jews support the actions carried out in Gaza that led to the death of more than 2,000 people killed - including more than 580 children - and more than 10,000 people injured, you could say that Jews share the guilt for what has not been a war but a straightforward massacre.

We can talk about innocent victims in Gaza or innocent victims in Iraq. Muslims are being killed and Muslim are doing the killing.